|
|
|
|
|
|
Buddha Head Gāndhāra, 2nd century CE. Gray schist. During his lifetime, Gautama Buddha strongly forbade his followers to fashion images of his human form. For many centuries after his death a tremendous reverence was maintained among his devotees to observe this important prohibition. But in 326 BCE, Alexander the Great entered the region of Northwest Pakistan, known in those times as Gāndhāra. Gāndhāra's chief city, Taxila, was a wealthy, prosperous and well-governed cultural centre from the 5th century BCE and an important meeting place of Indian and Mediterranean cultures. From the time of this early Mediterranean influence, Indian monarchs and patrons of the arts acquired a great passion for Greek sculptural genius. But it still took centuries before Buddha-statuary received large-scale commissions. It was there at Gāndhāra that the world's first anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha appeared, strongly redolent of Apollo the Orator. Crucial to note, the first human representation of the Buddha took place about the 2nd century CE – that is, about six hundred years after his death. |
